too, that internal dissension was growing within the
College itself. Charges in connection with the administration and with
the Principal's management were laid before the Royal Institution by the
Vice-Principal, who seems to have had the support of certain other
College officers, including Professor Wickes, and the Tutor, Chapman. As
a result of these charges, combined with the hopeless financial
situation in which the College was floundering, the Board of the Royal
Institution determined to exercise their visitatorial power and to make
an investigation. They would examine the entire working of the College,
its discipline, its administration and also the methods of collecting
and expending the rents and profits of the Estate of which no adequate
accounting had for some time been received. The visitation was made on
the 13th and 14th of November, 1844, and the meetings, not always
peaceful, were held in the council-room of the College. The Visitors
found that there were five Professors or Instructors, while only nine
students were enrolled in the college, that there was a lack of harmony
among the College officers, "some of whom were not on speaking terms
with each other," and that the outlook was not promising.

The following official report was forwarded to Lord Metcalfe, the
Governor-General, by the Lord Bishop of Montreal, the Rev. Dr. Mountain,
Principal of the Royal Institution, on December 11th, 1844:

"The Board of the Royal Institution, at the request of Professor Lundy,
Vice-Principal of McGill College, and in consequence of a variety of
circumstances leading them to believe such a step expedient and
necessary, met at Montreal on the 14th November, and, as Visitors of
McGill College under the Royal Charter, entered into an examination of
the whole affairs of that Institution.

"The general result of their investigation they are now desirous to lay
before Your Excellency, both because it is to Your Excellency's
interposition that the Board look for obtaining certain important
measures, which appear to them indispensable to the prosperity of the
College of which they are Visitors and Trustees.

"When the visitation of McGill College took place the Visitors found in
it nine students (fewer by half than at the same period last year, and
these, with one or two exceptions, boys) under the tuition of a
Principal, who is also Professor of Divinity, a Lecturer on Divinity, a
Vice-Principal, who is also Professor of